Transgender person Niazbeena says can’t go to school amid taunts

PESHAWAR: There are many transgender persons in the Pakhtun society who want to live a normal life like getting education, finding job and living with peace, but they cannot do so because the society doesn’t accept them.

Same is the story of Sudais, a transgender person in Peshawar, who is known as Niazbeena in her field.

Niazbeena said while talking to TNN that she also wanted to get education but could not do so because people outside the school keep on taunting her. She said it was not in her control to be born as a transgender person. Niazbeena said transgender persons are also created by Almighty Allah and they are not transgender by choice.

“The people who taunt us must remember that God will punish them for their sins. They shouldn’t make us curse them because it is well known that like our prayers, our curse is also very potent,” she said.

Niazbeena wishes she should have been a complete girl.

“If I were a girl, I would have married someone and looked after his children, but now what can it do in this society except participating in dance parties,” she lamented, and added: “Now I cannot do anything about my body, my gait, my style of speaking. It will remain the same until I am alive. I will have to live with it. People should also accept this reality.”

She said even people misbehave with her and her other transgender friends during and after music and dance parties. “People often tease us, beat us and even many of our friends are killed,” she said.

Niazbeena further said that the people taunting transgender persons must seek forgiveness of Almighty Allah.

“What will you do if your new-born baby turns out to be a transgender person? Do you have control on these things? Can you harm your baby if he or she is born like that,” Niazbeena quipped and advised the people to be polite with the transgender persons and allow them to live peacefully.

She demanded the government to provide her a job so that she could live her life honourably like a normal citizen of the country.